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Last month, following a lengthy period of disturbing behavior, Ezra Miller announced they were seeking help for what they described as “complex mental health issues.” They had been repeatedly arrested in Hawaii. They had been busted for theft. There had been claims that they had started a cult. That may all be behind them now, but a new Vanity Fair piece made public some more alarming claims about what they’d been up to.

The publication spoke to more than a dozen people who had either lived with or were still living at Miller’s secluded Vermont compound, which they call “The Mountain.” There, Miller lords over what was described as a “court harem” that was a kind of “patriarchal dictatorship” in which “Ezra controls all the sex as the man, and plays the women against each other, screams at them, belittles them in front of the others.”

During a trip to Iceland, Miller reportedly befriended a 55-year-old Native spiritual adviser named Jasper Young Bear, who would tell Miller they were “the next Messiah and that the Freemasons were sending demons out to kill [them].”

Those living at the Mountain claim that when Miller returned to the Mountain, he was prone to “grandiose speechifying.” They would refer to themselves as alternately Jesus or the devil, and they’ve hatched a bizarre narrative in which they and Tokata Iron Eyes, the 18-year-old non-binary person he’s alleged to have groomed, form a “union” that is “supposed to bring about the apocalypse.” What’s more, Miller has spoken about how the Flash, their DCEU character, is the Jesus of the DC’s multiverse.

There’s also reportedly lots of weapons and ammo, as well as an altar made of “bullets, weed, sage and Flash figurines.”

Speaking of the Flash, it was reportedly the role that got Miller to seek help. The notion that their role as Barry Allen was at risk was a wake-up call,” their rep told Vanity Fair. Indeed, as Miller’s antics filled the news, there was lots of speculation about how Warner Bros. Discovery would handle their $200 million Flash solo movie, which they stood by even as they buried another DC movie featuring Michael Keaton returning as Batman: Batgirl.

And yet Warner Bros. Discovery is sticking by The Flash and by their star, even reportedly offering plenty of NDAs in what three sources described as a “whack-a-mole style legal strategy of paying off alleged victims.” Meanwhile, there are conflicting reports about how seriously Miller is taking his treatment.

You can read the whole shocking Vanity Fair piece here.

As gasoline prices continue to rise, Chicago rapper Vic Mensa aims to give back to his hometown. In conjunction with the launch of his cannabis company, 93 Boyz, Mensa visited a BP gas station in Chicago and gave away $10,000 worth of gas over labor day weekend, TMZ reports.

The donation of $10,000 filled up over 200 cars, and was particularly timely for a woman who arrived at the gas station with only $5 to her name. She had come to the gas station in hopes that the $5 would get her enough gas to take her granddaughter to work.

“I don’t know how I’ma get gas to take you to work,” said the woman in a video. “We have $5 on the car then you all came. Ain’t nothing but God and blessings. I just want to say thank you, that’s all, okay.”

Mensa responded to the woman, saying, “God bless you. We appreciate you. 93 Boyz got you.”

In addition to free gas, Mensa also reportedly gave out free samples of his 93 Boyz products. The recreational consumption, possession, and sale of cannabis products was legalized in Chicago in 2020. 93 Boyz launched this year as Chicago’s first Black-owned cannabis brand.

According to the official 93 Boyz website, the cannabis company operates on “a core mission focused on giving back to the community.”

The Saints and Buccaneers do not like each other, as tends to be the case with divisional rivals in the NFL, and that’s particularly true of Bucs star receiver Mike Evans and Saints star corner Marshon Lattimore. Those two have been seeing each other twice a year for many years, battling on the outside and have been known to get into some physical and verbal altercations.

On Sunday, the Bucs visited New Orleans in a battle of the NFC South’s presumed favorites, and the defenses were dominating the day in what was a 3-3 game in the early fourth quarter. After the Bucs failed to convert a third down as a Tom Brady deep pass down the sideline went incomplete, Lattimore was jawing with Brady and Evans came sprinting over to light him up, sparking a brawl on the middle of the field.

Lattimore and Evans were ejected for their roles in the fight, with both teams getting handed offsetting unsportsmanlike penalties, and the Bucs were forced to punt the ball away on fourth down. The Saints immediately threw an interception trying to complete a bomb down the field, meaning the absences of Lattimore and Evans would be felt quickly with the Bucs offense coming back onto the field in a tie ball game. We’ll find out which team that proves to be more costly for as a tight game wears on, but each team lost a key contributor thanks to a rather wild sequence.

In his latest video, “Mini Me,” Houston rapper Tobe Nwigwe leads a group in dance in a garden, joined by his wife, Fat. While the two have a son in real life, Tobe addresses his “sons” in the rap game.

“Fat just had my son indeed, but a small catch / Is that I’ve had sons, just not out my ballsack / Fall back, I be appalled that / All that I’ve done for my sons don’t get wall plaques / Look, I should walk up in the room and see up on the wall / Greatest father figure of ’em all,” he raps.

Fat raps and adlibs on the chorus, saying, “I’m sick of you bein’ nice to all these boys, they’re our babies.”

The married couple is later joined by Dame D.O.L.L.A., who aims to maintain peace within himself and among others.

“Tell ’em roll out the red carpet, we special people / And we don’t see nobody as lesser equals / Boy, times change, keep the energy / We pray on enemy and never let him take our inner peace,” he raps.

In addition to putting out skillful rhymes, Tobe also stars on the Houston-set Netflix series Mo, on which, he plays the titular character’s childhood best friend.

Check out the video for “Mine Me” above.

Just last month, Grimes took to Twitter to ask her followers for recommendations on where she might be able to get elf ear implants. “Still debating this surgery cuz cartilage doesn’t heal so it requires permanent stitches,” she said, noting that this wouldn’t be some short-term modification to her appearance, but that elf ears are in fact, forever. Thousands of people offered their thoughts in replies Grimes, including her ex, Elon Musk, who said, “The downside of elf ear surgery probably outweighs the upside.” Wise words sir.

Well, based on a photograph that Grimes posted to Twitter on Saturday, it seems as though she might have found a plastic surgery clinic that she was comfortable enough with to have them give her those storied elf ear implants. “I did smthn crazy!,” she tweeted, along with a photo of herself (her head, mainly) in what very much looks like a post-surgery recovery state with her head and ears wrapped in a bandage.

Right after that, she tweeted about how she finished her new album and, “…perfected the last song in the plastic surgery clinic cuz they wouldn’t let me leave and we were laughing that this was the most Hollywood moment of all time.” Well then. If there are indeed elf ears under that bandage, this would seem to have been one extremely eventful weekend for Grimes. We’ll just have to wait and see what her ears look like soon. And oh yeah…what that album sounds like too.

DirecTV’s exclusive rights for NFL Sunday Ticket will run up after this season, and fans everywhere are extremely hopeful that the service that allows them to watch every game, every Sunday will go to some other provider that will have a better product.

Last week, many fans struggled to get into the Sunday Ticket app for kickoff in the 1 p.m. ET window, leading to refunds being issued for the disastrous start the the season, but DirecTV insisting they’d fixed the technical glitches.

For Week 2, fans didn’t seem to have any issues immediately and it appeared that, maybe, they’d get through the second week unscathed but as the first half wound down around the league, fans and media with Sunday Ticket began to tweet en masse about how their app had crashed and the servers wouldn’t work, leading to lots of blank screens and very angry tweets.

Considering the cost of Sunday Ticket ($294 for the To Go plan and $396 for the Max plan), it’s understandable why fans would be furious with the poor quality of the product and the constant crashing. There might be even more refunds on the way this week, but fans would prefer to just be able to watch games without the app crashing rather than getting some money back with constant interruptions.

For some reason, a number of game show hosts lean libertarian. Alex Trebek identified as neither liberal nor conservative, but he quietly held some in the middle beliefs. Supermarket Sweep host and sweater fanatic David Ruprecht was once the executive director of the Libertarian Party of California. Then there’s Pat Sajak. The Wheel of Fortune host is more openly right-leaning, which is why it shouldn’t be all that surprising that he posed for a picture with no less than Marjorie Taylor Greene.

It’s unclear where or when the photo was taken, or who first shared it, though among those who did was the rightwing extremist-monitoring account PatriotTakes. The pic features the Wheel of Fortune host sandwiched between Greene and Right Side Broadcasting Network (RSBN) reporter Bryan Glenn. Sajak boasts a big smile and a slightly too-open button-down. Weirdly, all three are looking in different directions, with only Glenn locking eyes with the camera.

Given Greene’s prolific history of controversial antics — from trivializing the Holocaust to speaking at white nationalist events to attacking school shooting survivors — the picture was not well-taken on social media.

There were also a lot of jokes.

Meanwhile, Sajak presides over a show that has a long history of contestants who embarrass themselves.

Dua Lipa’s sophomore album Future Nostalgia proves to be a hit two years after its release, as she is continuing to tour. Although, it seems a new era is underway. In an interview with Vogue Australia, the “Levitating” singer revealed that her third album is coming together.

“As I’m writing my new album, I feel even more liberated in a completely different way,” she said. “And even more in control than I thought.”

Elsewhere in the interview, she discussed what liberation meant to her — specifically in the context of living in a post Roe v Wade world.

As she often discusses matters in the realm of gender equality, notably on the Future Nostalgia cut, “Boys Will Be Boys,” Lipa wants to continue to use her platform to raise awareness and empower women.

“Freedom, especially as a woman, means to be able to take things into your own hands, to have control over the things that you believe in,” she said. “To really have a voice.”

While we don’t know much about Lipa’s third album in terms of producers or collaborators, Lipa appeared on Megan Thee Stallion’s sophomore album Traumazine for their duet, “Sweetest Pie.”

Dua Lipa and Megan Thee Stallion are Warner Music artists. Uproxx is an independent subsidiary of Warner Music Group

This article originally appeared on 04.27.22

Loneliness is one of the most dangerous health problems in the United States, although it’s seldom discussed. Psychology Today says loneliness has the same mortality risks as obesity, smoking, alcoholism and physical inactivity.

A meta-analysis from Brigham Young University found that social isolation may increase the risk of premature death by up to 50%. The problem with loneliness is that people suffer in silence and it afflicts the ones we don’t see.

A TikTok user who goes by the name Megan Elizabeth recently shared a touching story on social media about how her grandfather was feeling lonely so he reached out to her. The story shows what can happen when one person is brave enough to confront their social isolation and the important role grandkids can play in their grandparents’ lives.

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It started when Megan’s grandpa texted her to ask if she’d like to come over for a sleepover. “I haven’t been feeling well and miss you. We can order food and watch a mystery show. Love, grandpa,” he wrote.

Megan was happy to go see him, so grandpa made a series of requests to make the sleepover a hit.

“Could you pick up applesauce? The cinnamon kind,” he asked. “And if you go somewhere with mash potatoes, I would like that because I have no teeth and can only eat soft things. Ha!”

He also wanted some strawberry ice cream for dessert. “Thank you. You are my favorite granddaughter,” he ended the conversation. Megan later noted that she’s his only granddaughter.

Megan came by with a big bag of food and some ice cream and the two hung out and watched his favorite black-and-white “mystery movies.” When it was time for bed, grandpa hadn’t forgotten how to put her to sleep. He got her a glass of water to put by the bed in case she got thirsty and left a flashlight on the nightstand just in case his 29-year-old granddaughter got scared.

The next morning, at 5:30 am, he watched her leave for work.

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Grandfather and granddaughter grew up close to one another. Megan lived with her grandparents when she was young while her parents saved up money for a house. When they bought one, it was right across the street.

“I am so lucky to have grown up with my grandpa and my grandma (rest in peace),” she wrote on Instagram. “I feel so happy. I am thankful for my grandpa and he will never understand how much love he truly has shown me. And more importantly, the love he showed my grandma while she was alive. I believe in love and loyalty because of this man. He is my hero,” she added.

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Megan’s time with her grandfather made her realize a valuable lesson about her life.

“I think one of the most important realizations I have had recently is that it’s important to live in the moment but it is important to live in the now with intent,” she wrote on Instagram, “so that when you are 92, you look back and smile at all the people you loved, the memories you made and the life you chose to live.”

This article originally appeared on 01.03.22

The pandemic has caused many people to reevaluate their surroundings. When you’re stuck at home more often than you’d like, you start to pay a lot more attention to what goes on in your own backyard.

This type of introspection inspired wildlife photographer Carla Rhodes to get a closer look at the furry friends that live near her home in the Catskill mountains of New York.

What she found was magical.

“The winter of 2020-2021 was particularly brutal to humankind. After months of enduring the Covid-19 pandemic, we were now collectively slogging through winter. As a result of being stuck at home, I focused on my immediate surroundings like never before,” Rhodes said in a statement.

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Rhodes positioned a DSLR camera trap beneath her bird feeder to get an up-close glimpse of the wildlife that came to sample her delicious seeds. The results are an incredible series of photos of birds and other woodland creatures from a vantage point most people never see. Rhodes calls her project, “Beneath the Bird Feeder.”

The birdfeeder photos also gave a new glimpse into the behavior of several species of birds and rodents that call the Catskills home.

“As I got deeper into the project, intriguing observations emerged,” Rhodes says. “I noticed distinct repeat visitors such as a Dark-Eyed Junco with an overgrown beak, a deer mouse with a notched ear, and an irruption of Red-Breasted Nuthatches. Dark-Eyed Juncos always showed up at the crack of dawn and Northern Cardinals would always be the last visitor of the day as dusk turned into evening.”

Here are 15 of the most captivating photos that Rhodes captured from beneath her bird feeder.

1. Dark-eyed junco

“Often overlooked and considered drab ground-feeding birds, Dark-Eyed Juncos hold a special place in my heart due to their funny and curious behaviors. Every day they were first to arrive beneath the bird feeder,” Rhodes says. “Dark-Eyed Juncos were one of the most frequent and curious subjects beneath the bird feeder.”

2. Dark-eyed junco

3. Dark-eyed junco

4. Tufted titmouse

According to All About Birds, the tufted titmouse is “common in eastern deciduous forests and a frequent visitor to feeders.”

5. Mourning dove

​”Observing Mourning Doves was a daily pleasure, especially when they gathered to form a clean-up crew beneath the bird feeder. Mourning doves are monogamous and possibly mate for life,” Rhodes writes.

6. Mourning dove 

7.  Mourning doves

8. Blue jay

“Blue Jays are known for their intelligence and complex social systems with tight family bonds,” All About Birds says. “Their fondness for acorns is credited with helping spread oak trees after the last glacial period.”

9. Northern cardinal

“Northern Cardinals were always the last to show up beneath the bird feeder, shortly after dusk every evening,” Rhodes writes.

10. Black-capped chickadee

“Little flocks of Black-capped Chickadees enliven the winter woods with their active behavior and their cheery-sounding chick-a-dee callnotes as they fly from tree to tree, often accompanied by an assortment of nuthatches, creepers, kinglets, and other birds,” the Audubon field guide to North American birds says.

11. Black-capped chickadee

12. Eastern gray squirrel

Eastern gray squirrels are important members of forest ecosystems as they play a vital role in dispersing seeds.

 13. American red squirrel

The American red squirrel is known for its distinct bushy and dark red tail with hints of a white outline.

14. American red squirrel

15. Northern short-tailed shrew

If you see a northern short-tailed shrew, be careful. It’s venomous and paralyzes its victims with poisonous saliva. In humans, a bite can cause swelling and intense pain.